{"id":81234,"date":"2025-05-13T11:10:30","date_gmt":"2025-05-13T19:10:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/2025\/05\/13\/missouris-high-court-takes-up-dispute-on-local-marijuana-sales-tax-stacking\/"},"modified":"2025-05-14T19:47:02","modified_gmt":"2025-05-15T03:47:02","slug":"missouris-high-court-takes-up-dispute-on-local-marijuana-sales-tax-stacking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/2025\/05\/13\/missouris-high-court-takes-up-dispute-on-local-marijuana-sales-tax-stacking\/","title":{"rendered":"Missouri\u2019s High Court Takes Up Dispute On Local Marijuana Sales Tax Stacking"},"content":{"rendered":"<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s only supposed to be one local government, one boss, one master dictating outcomes and imposing the 3 percent tax.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

By Rebecca Rivas, Missouri Independent<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Missouri Supreme Court heard arguments Tuesday regarding whether or not cities and counties can stack marijuana sales taxes<\/a>, in a legal battle that began in 2023.<\/p>\n

The court\u2019s answer will impact more than 70 areas statewide, where both city and county governments have been imposing a 3 percent tax at dispensaries, according to Missouri Department of Revenue data.<\/p>\n

The court case focuses on Florissant-based dispensary Robust Missouri 3 LLC, where customers are paying a total sales tax of 20.988 percent, which includes a 3 percent sales tax from both the city of Florissant and St. Louis County.<\/p>\n

Robust argues it\u2019s unconstitutional to have two local governments taxing customers.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s only supposed to be one local government, one boss, one master dictating outcomes and imposing the 3 percent tax,\u201d said Eric Walter, Robust\u2019s attorney, at the Tuesday hearing.<\/p>\n

St. Louis County and St. Charles County have the authority to pass a 3 percent tax on unincorporated areas, he said, but not on their entire geographic footprint.<\/p>\n

A panel of Missouri appellate judges agreed with Robust in November, ruling that the constitution\u2019s \u201cplain, unambiguous\u201d language means cities and counties cannot stack marijuana sales taxes<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cOnly one local government is authorized to impose an additional three percent sales tax,\u201d Judge John Torbitzky of the Missouri Court of Appeals Eastern District wrote in the unanimous opinion.<\/p>\n

That decision reversed a lower court\u2019s ruling last year<\/a> that allowed both Florissant and St. Louis County to both impose a 3 percent sales tax on marijuana products.<\/p>\n

St. Louis County Circuit Judge Brian May wrote that if Robust\u2019s interpretation of the law were accepted, it would lead to \u201cabsurd outcomes,\u201d because \u201ca municipality or city would essentially be given carte blanche to ignore any county ordinance or regulation, including those related to public health and safety wholly unrelated to the taxing issue.\u201d<\/p>\n

May was largely talking about public health regulations\u2014particularly those that apply to marijuana dispensaries\u2014because public health in Florissant is regulated by St. Louis County.<\/p>\n

On Tuesday, Supreme Court Chief Justice Mary Russell asked Walter to respond to May\u2019s ruling that Robust\u2019s interpretation \u201ceffectively nullifies\u201d other county ordinances regarding health and welfare.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is not a county health code case,\u201d Walter said, an argument the appellate court agreed with.<\/p>\n

However, St. Louis County\u2019s attorney, Laura Robb said, Tuesday that public health is \u201cin the purpose\u201d of the constitutional amendment voters approved in 2022 legalizing recreational marijuana. Florissant relies on St. Louis County to impose public health ordinances on all its businesses, she said, because it doesn\u2019t have its own department of public health.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo it\u2019s only logical that portions of the revenue should be captured by the institution with the public health duties,\u201d Robb told judges Tuesday.<\/p>\n

Robb agreed with May that it would have an \u201cabsurd result to have dispensaries that are essentially not governed by any of the applicable public health ordinances that apply to every other building that\u2019s in Florissant.\u201d<\/p>\n

The constitutional amendment states that \u201clocal government\u201d means, \u201cin the case of an incorporated area, a village, town, or city; and, in the case of an unincorporated area, a county.\u201d<\/p>\n

At a\u00a0hearing last year<\/a>, attorneys for St. Louis and St. Charles counties argued the word \u201cand\u201d is key in the definition.<\/p>\n

Supreme Court Judge Kelly Broniec asked Robb to review the section of the constitutional amendment titled \u201clocal control.\u201d There, it outlines how residents can vote to ban dispensaries in their towns and cities.<\/p>\n

Broniec read the question the law states should be submitted to voters: \u201cShall (insert name of local government) ban all non-\u00admedical microbusiness dispensary facilities and comprehensive marijuana dispensary facilities from being located within (insert name of local government and, where applicable, its \u2019unincorporated areas\u2019) and forgo any additional related local tax revenue?\u201d<\/p>\n

Broniec asked if this provision supports the counties\u2019 definition of local government or Robust\u2019s?<\/p>\n

\u201cIf one of the local governments disallowed it and one allowed it\u2014if it was on the same ballot, let\u2019s say\u2014whose would control, if both the city and the county are a local government,\u201d Broniec asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know the answer to that question,\u201d Robb said.<\/p>\n

Walter later told Broniec that he loved her question.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was very insightful, because when you talk about the constitutional authority allowing the local government to outright ban dispensaries, there\u2019s a particular procedure,\u201d Walter said, \u201cand\u2026even dictates what the language needs to be when presented to the voters on the question.\u201d<\/p>\n

Walter pointed out that the constitution requires that each one of Missouri\u2019s eight congressional districts have no less than 24 dispensaries. The 2nd Congressional District is comprised almost entirely of St. Louis County, and if the county were able to impose a ban, there\u2019d be a few parts of St. Charles and Jefferson counties remaining to \u201ccram 24 dispensaries into.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat would invade the prerogative of all the 90 maybe unique municipalities within the county of St Louis,\u201d Walter said. \u201cAnd they should be allowed to decide whether or not they want these businesses for their citizens.\u201d<\/p>\n

This story was first published by Missouri Independent.<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

\n

Louisiana Committee Rejects Bill To Establish Marijuana Tax System To Prepare For Eventual Legalization<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\n

Photo courtesy of Chris Wallis \/\/ Side Pocket Images.<\/em><\/p>\n

The post Missouri\u2019s High Court Takes Up Dispute On Local Marijuana Sales Tax Stacking<\/a> appeared first on Marijuana Moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n


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\nRead More: Missouri\u2019s High Court Takes Up Dispute On Local Marijuana Sales Tax Stacking<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cThere\u2019s only supposed to be one local government, one boss, one master dictating outcomes and imposing the 3 percent tax.\u201d By Rebecca Rivas, Missouri Independent The Missouri Supreme Court heard arguments Tuesday regarding whether or not cities and counties can stack marijuana sales taxes, in a legal battle that beganContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":457,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[81],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81234"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/457"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=81234"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81234\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":81235,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81234\/revisions\/81235"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=81234"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=81234"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=81234"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}